Partner, General Counsel and COO | ADM Capital
Alexander Shaik
Partner, General Counsel and COO | ADM Capital
Team size: Three Legal, Five operations
In an increasingly complex global environment, how are you helping your organisation navigate risk while still supporting growth?
Good GCs should help steer the business towards growth strategies which recognise and balance associated legal and regulatory risks. Risk is impossible to eliminate, so successful strategies should focus on identifying and quantifying risk as part of an overall business decision. Supervising an APAC business involves building networks with advisers in each jurisdiction. Cultivating these relationships over time helps advisers achieve a better understanding of our firm’s issues and alert us where new regulations threaten our operations.
How has the role of General Counsel evolved in recent years, and where do you see GCs creating the most value today?
Historically, GCs were simply lawyers acting as in-house counsel to deal with purely legal issues. However, as business complexity and the regulatory environment have increased, a good GC now acts as a ‘risk manager’ within a company’s executive team, advising on minimising risks associated with business growth strategies.
How has AI changed the legal function recently (including in the past year), and how are you approaching it within your team?
AI advances allow us to move beyond routine day-to-day tasks such as filings, searches and template responses, enabling us to focus on the strategic issues which truly matter.
What does effective leadership look like for a General Counsel today, and where do GCs have the most impact?
A good GC should help a firm’s leadership effectively incorporate regulatory risk into its growth strategies. A good GC should also be able to multitask in order to build a strong outsourced advisory network and maintain an effective internal regulatory framework.
How has your relationship with the board changed, and where do you add the most value at board level?
A good GC should help a firm’s board of directors effectively incorporate regulatory risk into its growth strategies. The GC can also guide and curate board discussions to ensure that differing opinions are taken into account.
What has been your most significant challenge as General Counsel in recent years, and what did you learn from it?
The pace of change and proliferation of regulations creates a constantly changing legal landscape. Developing adviser networks, maintaining currency in new affairs, and focusing on principles-based approaches helps accommodate this change.
How do you build and maintain a strong legal team?
It is important to understand the career progression of each team member and what motivates them in their role. Rewarding experiences also involve being integrated into commercial deal teams.
What regulatory or risk trends are having the greatest impact on your role at present?
The rise of populism in politics creates an environment of enhanced risk for multi-jurisdictional operations acting onshore.
Looking ahead, what do you see as the main opportunity or challenge for in-house legal teams?
Good governance will always require input from core disciplines such as legal, finance and operations, and developments unlocking the GC from routine internal legal issues present an opportunity to engage more fully at the strategic governance level.
Partner; General Counsel | ADM Capital
Partner and general counsel | Asia Debt Management Hong Kong
